St. Paul Pioneer Press tech blog by Julio Ojeda-Zapata

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St. Paul Pioneer Press tech blog by Julio Ojeda-Zapata

AT&T laps Verizon in my LTE tests at Twin Cities airport

I’m excited about the soon-to-be-released iPhone 5, but not because it’s longer (accommodating another row of icons), thinner or lighter.

That’s all great, but I’m more pumped about the new Apple smartphone being designed for faster online access. Apple is incorporating a wireless-data technology called Long Term Evolution into its iconic handsets for the first time, making them potential downloading and uploading speed demons.

Because data is by far the most important smartphone function for me, not voice nor text, speed bumps like this are reasons to rejoice (assuming Apple’s claims hold up).

The iPhone is a latecomer to LTE, which is now a common feature on rival handsets. And since LTE is available in the Twin Cities from Verizon and (to a lesser extent) AT&T, Minnesotans have been availing themselves of broadband-grade wireless-Internet connections for a while.

LTE eventually will be ubiquitous. Verizon has a pretty big LTE footprint in this country with AT&T lagging but aggressively expanding. Sprint is in the early stages of its own LTE deployment, and T-Mobile has vowed it will do likewise next year.

AT&T now offers LTE service at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, and it has said it will activate LTE service in the Twin Cities by Thanksgiving, which will make the iPhone 5 all the more important for local phone buyers.

They have plenty of other LTE-compatible choices, however.

I’ve been using AT&T and Verizon versions of the Samsung Galaxy S III, which is a great Android smartphone. I was curious to see how LTE service on the all-but-identical devices compared, so I spent a bit of time doing speed tests at the Twin Cities airport. I did this on the same day, at the same time and in the same location (in the airport’s upper ticketing area).

The upshot: AT&T lapped Verizon, though both logged impressive speeds.

I take AT&T’s victory with a grain of salt since likely far fewer folks are using the newer network at the airport compared to the hordes of LTE-ready Verizon users. Still, I have to say (in a Darth Vader voice), “Impressive. Most impressive.”

Wireless-data downloads on the AT&T version of the Galaxy S III went as high as 47.5 megabits per second, which is much faster than my residential Comcast broadband-Internet connection.

In 20 tests using the Speedtest.net app, my AT&T downloads were consistently in the 20s and 30s, dipping below 20 megabits only once. They exceeded 40 megabits four times. The uploads exceeded 8 megabits all but once.

How about Verizon? In 20 tests, downloads were solidly in the 20s or high teens, dipping to 12.7 megabits once. Uploads were solidly in the teens, spiking to 25.6 megabits once and dipping to 5.6 megabits once.

Those packing recent-model but LTE-less AT&T handsets such as the iPhone 4S must use the wireless carrier’s slower HSPA+ data network. HSPA+ and LTE are both “4G,” which is mushy, potentially misleading marketing-speak for “faster wireless Internet,” but HSPA+ is almost always slower than LTE.

Still, AT&T’s HSPA+ service at the airport isn’t too shabby. In 20 attempts with an Android-based HTC One X, downloads exceeded 10 megabits twice and topped 8 megabits more than half the time. Uploads exceeded 1 megabit all but once.

But, as I expected, AT&T’s HSPA+ performance degraded within the Twin Cities core.

In another set of 20 tests while sitting in my Pioneer Press cubicle in downtown St. Paul, right by a window, downloads exceeded 3 megabits only once, with speeds below 1 megabit nearly half the time. Uploads never exceeded 1 megabit.

So, if wireless-data performance is paramount for you, an LTE-compatible handset (iPhone 5 or otherwise) is a must.

Don’t expect LTE to be consistently miraculous, however. Testing the Verizon version of the S III with LTE at my work desk, I saw wildly inconsistent downloads — between 9.4 and 1.7 megabits. Uploads never topped 5 megabits, and were usually much slower.